I. Прочтите текст и письменно ответьте на вопросы, следующие за ним.What is economics?1. Economics is the science of making choices. People must choose through their governments whether to build a dam or to repair highways with their taxes, whether to invest money to business or to expand national parks. In all these decisions every choice involves a cost. In fact, economics is the study of the choice that people make and the actions that they take in order to make the best use of scarce resources in meeting their wants.2. It is characteristic of any society that while wants of people are growing constantly, the economic resources required to satisfy these wants are limited and scarce. Economic resources have been classified as material resources (raw materials and capital) and labour resources (labour force and entrepreneurship). Scarcity of resources makes it necessary to save them. As a result any economic system is trying to find most effective and efficient ways of utilizing resources for the production of goods and services. 3. There are different economic systems in the world today. The market economy, or free enterprise, is considered by many economists as the most effective one. A market is a set of arrangements through which buyers and sellers make contact and do business, in which choices concerning the allocation of resources and transactions among members of society involving factors of production, incomes, goods and services are left to countless independent decisions of individual consumers and producers acting on their own behalf. 4. One of the main laws of the market is the law of supply and demand. It says that if demand exceeds supply, the price tends to rise and when supply exceeds demand the price tends to fall. The market functions as a rationing device with the price mechanism as its principal instrument. Another important force of the market is competition. It protects the customers, because they have the right of choice and they benefit from the fact that competition keeps price close to costs. And it makes producers and suppliers of scarce resources utilize them economically. 5. People qualified as economists can be involved in a great deal of fields. Academic economists are engaged in teaching, writing and doing research in colleges and universities, they develop and test new theoretical models, provide consulting services to governments and businesses. Business economists forecast sales and costs, help firms anticipate government policy, etc. Government economists wear a second hat as policy analysts forecasting tax revenues and interest rates, monitoring prices, computing total output and performing other useful tasks in the public sector [12, 14].

1. What does economics study? 2. How are economic resources classified? 3. Why should economic resources be saved? 4. What economic system is considered as the most effective one? 5. What is the definition of the market?6. What is one of the main laws of the market? What are functions of the competition?7. What do economists do in general?

IV. Найдите инфинитив и определите его форму и функцию в предложении. Предложения переведите (см. образец 5).1. One of the best ways to get a feeling for economics is to examine some problems in the field.2. Consumers use their income to purchase consumer goods or to save.

3. The main social purpose of the economy is to produce goods and services for the satisfaction of the needs and wants of consumers. 4. Our company needs to cut our costs by half if we are to make a profit.5. To study the economy in general is the aim of macroeconomics.

VI. Преобразуйте предложения, употребляя причастия в соответствующей функции (см. образец 6).1. As Britain was the first big trading country, it established a network of trading relationship all over the world.2. Scarcity is the condition that results from the imbalance between relatively unlimited wants and relatively limited resources. 3. When the producers reorganized the work process, they managed to increase labour productivity.

VII. Найдите герундий и определите его форму и функцию в предложении. Предложения переведите (см. образец 7).1. The aim of economics is studying our everyday lives and the general life of our commodities in order to understand the whole economic system of which we are part.2. The export manager went on collecting and estimating data on international trade.3. The capital which people provide to help new business is accumulated by a deliberate policy of saving surpluses. 4. After reducing per unit production cost the company succeeded in decreasing the price of the product.5. Solving the problems dealing with scarcity is the general task performed by economists.